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Artworks
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Barbara Wilkerson examining Water Dreaming at Kalipinypa by Johnny Warangkula Tjupurrula (c. 1918–2001)
with collector Danny Goldberg, 2023.
Photography by Sandee Oliver.
Johnny Warangkula Tjupurrula Luritja Language Group, c. 1925-12 February 2001
Water Dreaming at Kalipinypa, 1972Synthetic polymer paint on composition board31 ¾ x 29 ¾ inches (80.65 x 75.57 cm)© The Estate of the Artist, by permission of Papunya Tula Artists through the Aboriginal Artists Agency. Photography by Tony De Camillo for the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell UniversityLuritja Language Group Provenance
The Artist, painted at Stuart Art Centre, August 1972
Stuart Art Centre, Alice Springs, Northern Territory
Tim Guthrie Collection, Melbourne
Sotheby's, Melbourne, Important Aboriginal Art, 30 June 1997, lot 15
Private Collection, Melbourne
Sotheby's, Melbourne, Aboriginal Art, 26-27 June 2000, lot 70
Collection of John and Barbara Wilkerson, New York
Exhibitions
Papunya Tula: Genesis and Genius, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 18 August - 12 November 2000
Icons of the Desert: Early Aboriginal Paintings from Papunya, The Herbert F Johnson Museum, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 10 January - 5 April 2009; Fowler Museum of Cultural History, University of California, Los Angeles, 3 May - 2 August 2009; Grey Art Gallery, New York University, New York, 1 September - 5 December 2009
Tjukurrtjanu: Origins of Western Desert Art, The Ian Potter Centre, National Gallery Victoria, Melbourne, Australia, 30 September 2011- 12 February 2012; Musee du quai Branly, Paris, France, 9 October 2012- 20 January 2013
Abstraction & the Dreaming: Aboriginal Paintings from Australia’s Western Desert (1971 – Present), Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art, Utah State University, Utah, 11 September - 12 December 2015
Australian Consulate-General New York, Official Consul General Residence, New York, 5 October 2021 - 20 October 2022
60 over 50: 60 Paintings from 50 Years of Australian First Nations Art, UOVO, New York, May 2023Irriṯitja Kuwarri Tjungu (Past and Present Together): Contemporary Aboriginal Painting from the Australian Desert, Brigham Young University Museum of Art, 18 July – 6 December, 2025; Grey Art Museum at New York University, 22 January – 11 April, 2026; Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art at University of Oklahoma, 26 September, 2026 – April 2027Publications
Bardon, Geoffrey, and James Bardon. Papunya, A Place Made After the Story: The Beginnings of the Western Desert Painting Movement. The Miegunyah Press, 2004, p. 168, painting 76.
Benjamin, Roger, Fred Myers, Vivien Johnson, et al. Icons of the Desert: Early Aboriginal Paintings from Papunya. Herbert F. Johnson Museum, Cornell University, 2009.
Connors, Thomas. "Cultural Crossings." The Magazine Antiques, July/August 2025, pp. 130–141.
Genocchio, Benjamin. Dollar Dreaming: Inside the Aboriginal Art World. Hardie Grant, 2008, p. 15 (illus.), pp. 112–116.
Kean, John. Dot Circle & Frame. Upswell Publishing, 2023.
Merlino, Vanessa, and Luke Scholes. 60 over 50: 60 Paintings from 50 Years of Australian First Nations Art. UOVO, 2023, pp. 46–47 (illus.)
Myers, Fred, and Henry Skerritt, eds. Irrititja Kuwarri Tjungu (Past and Present Together): Fifty Years of Papunya Tula Artists. University of Virginia Press, 2022, p. 113 (illus.)
Myers, Fred, and Terry Smith. Six Paintings from Papunya: A Conversation. Duke University Press, 2024.
Perkins, Hetti, and Hannah Fink. Papunya Tula: Genesis and Genius. Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2000, pp. 63, 281 (illus.)
Sotheby's. Aboriginal Art. Melbourne, 26 June 2000, pp. 58–59.
Sotheby's. Important Aboriginal Art. Melbourne, 30 June 1997, pp. 16–17.
“Water Dreaming at Kalipinypa is perhaps the pinnacle of Warangkula’s early oeuvre. The unusually large surface area of this board provided Warangkula with a rare opportunity to explore ideas and techniques he had been developing throughout 1972. Beneath his delicately dotted overlays lies a myriad of iconography and design that relates to the presence and actions of the ancestral being Winpa. At Kalipinypa, Winpa sang and repeatedly clapped his boomerangs, thereby conjuring a huge storm into being. Between clashes of lightning and thunder, rain and hail fell upon the desert floor, causing catastrophic flooding. The linear patterning evokes the movement of branches, leaves and grasses carried by the sweeping floods. Among Warangkula’s highly textured surface, Winpa’s ovoid-shaped ceremonial objects meld subtly into the shifting geography.”
— 60 over 50: 60 Paintings from 50 Years of Australian First Nations Art, 2023, p. 46
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